DP supports approval of
supplementary budget
PHILIPSBURG--Parliament has agreed to raise government’s loan ceiling by NAf. 550 million so it can refinance expiring loans. The supplementary budget regulating the loan ceiling increase was approved with twelve votes in favour and three against.
Several Members of Parliament did not vote because they either were not present or did not sign in for the meeting. Member of Parliament for the Democratic Party Erno Labega also voted in favour.
He motivated his vote saying DP had voted in favour of the November 2, 2006, Final Accord and several items on the Central Government budget were a direct result of that accord. “I would be crazy to vote against the budget,” Labega said.
The public debate on the supplementary budget did not take long. However, emotions ran high in the Central Committee meeting earlier during the day.
PAR political faction leader Glenn Sulvaran accused the opposition of being paid just to be “against” everything that reached the floor of Parliament. He was reacting to statements made by MAN Parliamentarian Dwigno Puriel, who denounced the Central Government because it unjustifiably assumed that the Dutch Government would keep its promises to pay the debt of the Netherlands Antilles.
This was the main reason Parliament had to discuss a supplementary budget, Puriel said.
Sulvaran refuted this statement and said the reasons for the supplementary budget had to do with a change in the collective sector, meaning that the debts to, for example, the Social Insurance Bank SVB would not be paid anymore by the Dutch Government.
Also the fact that the Consensus Kingdom Resolution containing General Enactment regulating financial supervision for Curaçao and St. Maarten will not be ready before the end of the year has made it necessary to submit a supplementary budget.
The Central Government expected the resolution to have gone into effect by the second half of 2008. However, some delay has occurred and it is not expected that the Kingdom Council of Ministers will approve the resolution before November 1.
Also, the Financial Supervisory Committee CFT will have to review the Central Government budget and decide whether it complies with the financial norms as agreed in the November 2, 2006, accord, before the debt relief can start.
